Inside The Lavish Life Of William And Kate's Children

Kate Middleton and her husband, Prince William, have faced new roles within the royal family following the September 2022 death of Queen Elizabeth II. The royal couple added to their titles, becoming the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall and Cambridge, as well as the Prince and Princess of Wales — with William being next in line for the throne, following his father, King Charles III. They're also patrons of several organizations; Kate has been named the patron of the Rugby Football Union and the Rugby Football League thanks to her athletic prowess. Both were once the domain of Prince Harry, but since he left his senior royal position for California with wife Meghan Markle, William and Kate have filled in.

Despite all of these royal duties, the Wales' are, first and foremost, parents. Kate — aka Catherine, Princess of Wales — admitted that the pressure of naming their three children caused some struggle at their births, since it was an occasion for which the world was waiting. Do they want more children? Only time will tell, but Kate reportedly made a funny admission about kids in February 2022. Rebecca English of the Daily Mail tweeted that Kate apparently said that working with children makes her "very broody," an expression for wanting to have a baby, allegedly adding, "William always worries about me meeting under one-year-olds. I come home saying 'let's have another one.'" 

Meanwhile, William and Kate's three children — Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis — are well loved and very well cared for. Let's take a look inside their lavish life.

The long line of royal tradition around childbirth meant that royal babies were typically born at Buckingham Palace, according to British Heritage. However, this all changed in the 1970s, when Princess Anne gave birth to her children at St. Mary's Hospital in London, and Princess Diana later chose the same location when she gave birth to Prince William.

When Catherine, Princess of Wales, gave birth to her children, she also chose the Lindo Wing at St. Mary's Hospital. The medical team involved in the birth of Kate Middleton and Prince William's children was immense. Gynecologist and obstetrician Professor Tiong Ghee Teoh was just one of the 23 people who comprised Kate's medical unit, according to Hello! magazine. "We had a huge team," he told the outlet. "Anything that could possibly go wrong, we had a team of people behind each speciality." Noting that the whole team was ready three months before Kate's due dates lest something come up, Professor Teoh also mentioned that everyone on the medical team understood that confidentiality was paramount, saying, "Everyone was sworn to secrecy."

Kate struggled with hyperemesis gravidarum, an extreme case of morning sickness, with each of her pregnancies, which NBC News reported meant that she was likely afflicted with "severe nausea, vomiting, weight loss, and dehydration." With hospitalization being common in such cases, Kate's pregnancies were reportedly challenging experiences.

Prince George knows what his future will look like and that his destiny is to become the King of England. However, parents Catherine, Princess of Wales, and William, Prince of Wales, are walking an unusually fine line for child rearing: How to impress upon their eldest son and other children what it means to be a royal without causing stress.

Royal biographer Katie Nicholl wrote about Kate Middleton and Prince William's apparent dilemma in her 2022 book "The New Royals." She wrote, "They are raising their children, particularly Prince George, with an awareness of who he is and the role he will inherit, but they are keen not to weigh them down with a sense of duty." In a somewhat sassy fashion, George reportedly used his family clout in some showdowns at school. "George understands he will one day be king and as a little boy sparred with friends at school, outdoing his peers with the killer line: 'My dad will be king so you better watch out,'" Nicholl claimed (via Page Six).

While George might be using his royal family as leverage at school, William and Kate do their best to keep their children's childhoods as normal as possible. On a February 2020 appearance on the "Happy Mum, Happy Baby" podcast, Kate explained when she felt happiest: "I'm with my family outside in the countryside and we're all filthy dirty," she answered. That certainly sounds like a nice departure from any royal pretensions.

Kate Middleton and Prince William like to get away with their family when they can take a break from royal duties. Sometimes, the vacations are outright fabulous. The Prince and Princess of Wales love the Caribbean Island of Mustique, according to The Sun, and they've used it as a favorite vacation spot since 2008, back when they were still dating. The privacy of the island means that they can relax away from the spotlight (it's worth noting that it's in a no-fly zone, so no one can get photos of them). Prince George celebrated his sixth birthday in Mustique, in a private villa they rented for two weeks of sun and fun. The villa costs over $30,000 U.S. dollars a week to rent. Meanwhile, the couple also love to ski in France at Courchevel with their kids, per Hello! magazine.

However, they keep things a little more royal for vacations closer to home. The late Queen Elizabeth II loved the Scottish estate Balmoral, and William and Kate often visited her in the summer. Royal biographer Ingrid Seward told The Sun, "Balmoral is absolute paradise for children. They can do all the country things, swimming and fishing in the lochs and George might even go rabbit and grouse shooting with William."

William, Kate, and the kids also like vacationing in England's Isles of Scilly in Cornwall, particularly the island of Tresco, according to a later publication by Hello!, where William used to vacation with his parents and brother when he was young.

Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis began attending Lambrook School in the fall of 2022, right before their great-grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II, died. The new school was a result of their family's move to Adelaide Cottage on the grounds of the Windsor estate, according to Express, after moving away from Kensington Palace and the thrum of London. Tuition for the school ranges on the age of the child, The U.S. Sun pointed out, but all told, William, Prince of Wales, and Catherine, Princess of Wales, were said to be paying over $58,000 U.S. dollars annually to send their three kids to the exclusive school. Two of Queen Victoria's grandsons previously attended Lambrook, so the royal children are even carrying on a family lineage.

Education at Lambrook goes beyond basic curriculum, however. The royal children, along with their classmates, will learn about beekeeping and have access to a dance studio and a performing arts center, which will include music and acting. All of this comes under the additional pedagogy of Enrichment Afternoons, according to the school's website, to "complement their academic studies."

The royal presence at Lambrook hasn't been a welcome experience for all, though. Some of the parents, per Express, are reportedly upset by all of the attention Lambrook is now receiving thanks to such famous pupils and worry that the privacy of the school will be compromised.

While Lambrook School offers a boarding option, Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis live at home in Adelaide Cottage with parents Kate Middleton and Prince William, as of this writing, making them day students. This has marked a departure from more traditional royal ways. As the Evening Standard noted, the royal family have typically sent their children off to boarding school at 8 years old.

William himself was sent to boarding school at this age, attending Ludgrove School in Berkshire, according to Hello! magazine, as was his brother, Prince Harry. King Charles III also attended boarding school, first at Cheam Preparatory School in Berkshire and later in Scotland at Gordonstoun. According to BBC News, the story is that Charles was very unhappy at boarding school, particularly the latter. He once told The Observer (via BBC News), "I didn't enjoy school as much as I might have, but that was only because I'm happier at home than anywhere else."

For the Wales children, then, this move has not only been a major break in tradition. they're also said to be staying close to their parents and leaving the hubbub of London because the they vastly prefer doing family activities in the country. "They are such an outdoorsy family, London just wasn't working for them anymore," an insider told People. "The countryside is definitely their happy place."

For Prince William, Kate Middleton, and their three children, there's no shortage of homes to choose from. The late Queen Elizabeth II gave William and Kate Anmer Hall as a wedding present, according to Hello!. While most people get toasters for this occasion, the couple got the Norfolk-based Georgian home that boasts 10 bedrooms, a tennis court, and a swimming pool, per Town & Country, and have since kept Anmer Hall as a summer retreat.

The Prince and Princess of Wales then moved to Kensington Palace's Apartment 1A, a residency in the heart of London that has rooms for staff, nurseries, three bedrooms, and five reception rooms, as reported by Hello! magazine. As of this writing, they have also kept this location for when they need to be in town.

In the summer of 2022, as previously mentioned, William and Kate moved their family to Adelaide Cottage near Lambrook, the children's school. The residency, as Vogue noted, is on the grounds of Windsor Castle, and the Wales' moved there to be closer to the queen, who had moved there before her death. The home was built in 1831 and is listed on England's National Historic Sites, according to Architectural Digest. What makes the home so charming is that parts of it were made using structures from other famous sites. For instance, the primary bedroom features a "coved ceiling with gilded dolphins and rope ornament reused from the Royal yacht 'Royal George,'" per Historic England, so it's a treasure trove of history.

Prince George's birthdays have been memorable since the beginning. For the little heir's third birthday, dad Prince William joked that his son might be overly indulged. In Portsmouth, England, at the America's Cup World Series of yacht racing, William was asked what presents George had recently received. "I am not telling, he got too many things," William answered (via E! News). "He's far too spoiled."

Princess Charlotte hasn't fared too badly either. The former President of Mexico Enrique Peña Nieto, for example, gave Charlotte a rattle made of white gold, bejeweled in rubies, sapphires, and diamonds, according to Hello! magazine, worth $44,000 for her first birthday. Meanwhile, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau gifted her a book and snowsuit, as well as donated $100,000 Canadian dollars to Immunize Canada in her honor, per BBC News.

While the rest of the world steps up in terms of gifts, Catherine, Princess of Wales, keeps things a little more homemade for her children's birthdays. "I love making the cake," Kate Middleton said to chef Mary Berry on 2019's "A Berry Royal Christmas" (via Vogue). "It's become a bit of a tradition that I sort of stay up until midnight with ridiculous amounts of cake mix and icing. I make far too much, but I love it." It's pretty clear at this point that the royal kids get thoroughly celebrated on their big days.

When your great-grandmother is the late Queen Elizabeth II, celebrity friends seem par for the course. When Prince George was only three, he met former President Barack Obama and then-first lady Michelle Obama, when the world leaders came to Kensington Palace to have dinner with Prince William, Catherine, Princess of Wales, and Prince Harry, according to NBC News. George came out to greet the famous couple in his pajamas and a bathrobe and briefly rode a rocking horse. The Obamas gave George a stuffed animal of a Portuguese Water Dog, their family's favorite breed.

In September 2020, George and his two younger siblings, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis, all got to meet environmentalist and narrator Sir David Attenborough, according to Insider. The beloved voice of "Planet Earth" came to Kensington Palace and met the whole family. William and Kate Middleton shared the sweet meeting on Instagram, explaining in the post that Attenborough was there to discuss the EarthShot Prize, the environmental prize that William has initiated through The Royal Foundation.

But Attenborough also came bearing gifts: He gifted George with tooth from a giant shark called a carcharocles megalodon. "Sir David found the tooth on a family holiday to Malta in the late 1960s, embedded in the island's soft yellow limestone which was laid down during the Miocene period some 23 million years ago," the post read. "Carcharocles is believed to have grown to 15 metres in length, which is about twice the length of the Great White, the largest shark alive today."

With all the family's royal tours, it only makes sense that Prince William and Kate Middleton's children have trotted around the globe a considerable amount for such young kids. When Prince George was one, for example, he tagged along on his parents' royal tour of Australia and New Zealand, according to People. A nanny accompanied the family, and of the whole trip, George and his parents only spent a couple of nights apart, per The Guardian. Interestingly, the trip required special permission from the late Queen Elizabeth II. Part of royal protocol prohibits two heirs to travel together on the same plane, in case something happens, The Guardian noted, meaning that William and George should have traveled separately. However, the queen allowed it for this trip.

Princess Charlotte also got a taste for travel at an early age. In September 2016, she joined her older brother and parents on a royal tour of Canada, per Royal, and played with children of Canadian military members. After Charlotte and George made new, Canadian friends, an insider told People: "The children have good fun together. They are brilliant kids — very playful and cheerful."

When the children don't get to accompany their parents on royal tours, they have an adorable way of staying close. For example, when William and Kate toured the Caribbean in 2022, the former explained (via People): "We let them know where we are and [George] finds us on the map and puts a pin in it and shares with the others."

It's not just Catherine, Princess of Wales, and William, Prince of Wales, who dote on their three children. All of their extended relatives are very involved and devoted to the kids. Carole Middleton is famously a hands-on grandmother to the brood, along with Pippa Middleton's children, too. In a 2021 interview with Good Housekeeping, she spoke of how much she engages with her grandkids. "I want to run down the hills, climb the trees and go through the tunnel at the playground," Carole said. "As long as I am able to, that's what I'll be doing. I cook with them, I muck around dancing, we go on bike rides."

Even the late Queen Elizabeth II was a doting and constant presence in the lives of her great-grandchildren, and when they would come stay with her, she made sure that there was always a little gift in their rooms, per People. Adorably, as Kate Middleton once shared, they called her "Gan-Gan."

King Charles III also dotes on his grandchildren. According to a later publication by People, he had William and Prince Harry's tree house at Highgrove House fixed up for Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis. An insider said, "Charles is a warm and caring guy, but he comes even more alive around little George. He loves spending time with him." Clearly, the three Wales children are sources of joy to everyone in the family.

When it comes to the clothing that Kate Middleton and Prince William choose to dress their children, they keep things surprisingly simple. Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis are frequently photographed in accessible clothing from Zara, Mango, and H&M, according to Hello! magazine. Their items of clothing often cost around $10-$20 an item in U.S. dollars. Even their shopping experiences seem ordinary: Someone who saw them all shopping at Sainsbury's department store claimed, "She [Kate] was just having a little bit of a walk around. They were looking at the clothes when I saw them. Charlotte was looking at the dresses, she was dead cute."

The ordinary styles and brands of the children's clothing is actually a deliberate choice made by Catherine, Princess of Wales. According to the Daily Mail, Kate is well aware of the influence of her children's outfits. In 2016, she dressed Charlotte in an outfit that was almost identical to an outfit that she chose for her daughter in 2015. Brand consultant Holly Peacock told the outlet, "Rather than creating a shopping frenzy around her daughters supposed 'endorsement' of the designer, she's attempting to represent the normality of her family by dressing her child in a similar outfit twice." 

In this one sense, at least, William and Kate children have a seemingly normal, relatable life.